Oak Openings Part 31

"What has become of the thousands of scape-goats that the ancient Hebrews must have turned loose in the wilderness? Answer me that, Bourdon?"

"You might as well ask me, sir, what has become of the thousands of Hebrews who turned them loose. I suppose all must be dead a thousand years ago. Scape-goats are creatures that even Injins would not like."

"All this is a great mystery, Bourdon--a much greater mystery than our friend Peter, whom you have so often said was a man so unaccountable. By the way, he has given me a charge to perform an office between you and Margery, that I had almost forgotten. From what he said to me, I rather think it may have some connection with our safety. We have enemies among these savages, I feel very certain; though I believe we have also warm friends."

"But what have you in charge that has anything to do with Bourdon and me?" asked the wondering Margery, who was quick to observe the connection, though utterly at a loss to comprehend it.

The missionary now called a halt, and finding convenient seats, he gradually opened the subject with which he had been charged by Peter to his companions. The reader is probably prepared to learn that there was no longer any reserve between le Bourdon and Margery on the subject of their future marriage. The young man had already pressed an immediate union, as the wisest and safest course to be pursued. Although the savage American is little addicted to abusing his power over female captives, and seldom takes into his lodge an unwilling squaw, the bee-hunter had experienced a good deal of uneasiness on the score of what might befall his betrothed. Margery was sufficiently beautiful to attract attention, even in a town; and more than one fierce-looking warrior had betrayed his admiration that very day, though it was in a very Indian-like fas.h.i.+on. Rhapsody, and gallant speeches, and sonnets, form no part of Indian courts.h.i.+p; but the language of admiration is so very universal, through the eyes, that it is sufficiently easy of comprehension. It was possible that some chief, whose band was too formidable to be opposed, might take it into his head to wish to see a pale-face squaw in his wigwam; and, while it was not usual to do much violence to a female's inclinations on such occasions, it was not common to offer much opposition to those of a powerful warrior. The married tie, if it could be said to exist at all, however, was much respected; and it was far less likely that Margery, a wife, would thus be appropriated, than Margery, unmarried. It is true, cases of unscrupulous exercise of power are to be found among Indians, as well as among civilized men, but they are rare, and usually are much condemned.

The bee-hunter, consequently, was well disposed to second Peter's project. As for Margery herself, she had half yielded all her objections to her lover's unaided arguments, and was partly conquered before this reinforcement was brought into the field against her. Peter's motive was much canva.s.sed, no one of them all being able to penetrate it. Boden, however, had his private opinion on the subject, nor was it so very much out of the way. He fancied that the mysterious chief was well disposed to Margery, and wished to put her as far as possible beyond the chances of an Indian wigwam; marriage being the step of all others most likely to afford her this protection. Now this was not exactly true, but it was right enough in the main. Peter's aim was to save the life of the girl; her gentle attractions, and kind attentions to himself having wrought this much in her favor; and he believed no means of doing so as certain as forming a close connection for her with the great medicine-bee-hunter. Judging of them by himself, he did not think the Indians would dare to include so great a conjurer in their schemes of vengeance, and was willing himself that le Bourdon should escape, provided Margery could go free and unharmed with him. As for the bee-hunter's powers, he had many misgivings; they might be dangerous to the red men, and they might not. On this subject, he was in the painful doubts of ignorance, and had the wide area of conjecture open before his mind. He saw; but it was "as in a gla.s.s, darkly."

Margery was disposed to delay the ceremony, at least until her brother and sister might be present. But to this le Bourdon himself was not much inclined. It had struck him that Gershom was opposed to an early marriage, most probably because he fancied himself more secure of the bee-hunter's ingenious and important aid in getting back to the settlements, so long as this strong inducement existed to cling to himself, than if he should release his own hold of Margery, by giving her at once to her lover. Right or wrong, such was the impression taken up by le Bourdon, and he was glad when the missionary urged his request to be permitted to p.r.o.nounce the nuptial benediction on the spot.

Little ceremony is generally used in an American marriage. In a vast many cases no clergyman is employed at all; and where there is, most of the sects have no ring, no giving away, nor any of those observances which were practised in the churches of old. There existed no impediment, therefore; and after a decent interval spent in persuasions, Margery consented to plight her vows to the man of her heart before they left the spot. She would fain have had Dorothy present, for woman loves to lean on her own s.e.x on such occasions, but submitted to the necessity of proceeding at once, as the bee-hunter and the missionary chose to term it.

A better altar could not have been selected in all that vast region. It was one of nature's own erecting; and le Bourdon and his pretty bride placed themselves before it, with feelings suited to the solemnity of the occasion. The good missionary stood within the shade of a burr oak in the centre of those park-like Openings, every object looking fresh, and smiling, and beautiful. The sward was gieen, and short as that of a well-tended lawn; the flowers were, like the bride herself, soft, modest, and sweet; while charming rural vistas stretched through the trees, much as if art had been summoned in aid of the great mistress who had designed the landscape. When the parties knelt in prayer--which all present did, not excepting the worthy corporal--it was on the verdant ground, with first the branches of the trees, and then the deep, fathomless vault of heaven for a canopy. In this manner was the marriage benediction p.r.o.nounced on the bee-hunter and Margery Waring, in the venerable Oak Openings. No gothic structure, with its fretted aisles and cl.u.s.tered columns, could have been onehalf as appropriate for the union of such a couple.

CHAPTER XXII.

No shrift the gloomy savage brooks, As scowling on the priest he looks; Cowesa.s.s--cowesa.s.s--tawkich wessa.s.seen!

Let my father look on Bornazeen-- My father's heart is the heart of a squaw, But mine is so hard that it does not thaw, --WHITTIER.

Leaving the newly-married couple to pursue their way homeward, it is now our province to return to Prairie Round. One accustomed to such scenes would easily have detected the signs of divided opinions and of agitating doubts among the chiefs, though nothing like contention or dispute had yet manifested itself. Peter's control was still in the ascendant, and he had neglected none of his usual means of securing influence. Perhaps he labored so much the harder, from the circ.u.mstance that he now found himself so situated, as to be compelled to undo much that he had previously done.

On the other hand, Ungque appeared to have no particular cause of concern. His manner was as much unoccupied as usual; and to his habit of referring all his influence to sudden and powerful bursts of eloquence, if design of any sort was entertained, he left his success.

We pa.s.s over the details of a.s.sembling the council. The spot was not exactly on the prairie, but in a bit of lovely "Opening" on its margin, where the eye could roam over a wide extent of that peculiar natural meadow, while the body enjoyed the shades of the wood. The chiefs alone were in the circle, while the "braves" and the "young men" generally formed a group on the outside; near enough to hear what pa.s.sed, and to profit by it, if so disposed. The pipe was smoked, and all the ordinary customs observed, when Bear's Meat arose, the first speaker on that momentous occasion.

"Brothers," he said, "this is the great council on Prairie Round to which we have been called. We have met before, but not here. This is our first meeting here. We have travelled a long path to get here. Some of our brethren have travelled farther. They are at Detroit. They went there to meet our great Canada father, and to take Yankee scalps. How many scalps they have taken I do not know, or I would tell you. It is pleasant to me to count Yankee scalps. I would rather count them, than count the scalps of red men. There are still a great many left. The Yankees are many, and each Yankee has a scalp. There should not be so many. When the buffaloes came in the largest droves, our fathers used to go out to hunt them in the strongest parties. Their sons should do the same. We are the sons of those fathers. They say we look like them, talk like them, live like them--we should ACT like them. Let another speak, for I have done."

After this brief address, which bore some resemblance to a chairman's calling a meeting of civilized men to order, there was more smoking.

It was fully expected that Peter would next arise, but he did not.

Perceiving this, and willing to allow time to that great chief to arrange his thoughts, Crowsfeather a.s.sumed the office of filling the gap. He was far more of a warrior than of an orator, and was listened to respectfully, but less for what he said, than for what he had done.

A good deal of Indian boasting, quite naturally, was blended with HIS discourse.

"My brother has told you of the Yankee scalps," he commenced. "He says they are many. He says there ought to be fewer. He did not remember who sat so near him. Perhaps he does not know that there are three less now than there were a moon since. Crowsfeather took three at Chicago. Many scalps were taken there. The Yankees must be plentier than the buffaloes on the great prairies, if they can lose so many scalps often, and send forth their warriors. I am a Pottawattamie. My brothers know that tribe.

It is not a tribe of Jews, but a tribe of Injins. It is a great tribe.

It never was LOST. It CANNOT be lost. No tribe better knows all the paths, and all the best routes to every point where it wishes to go.

It is foolish to say you can lose a Pottawattamie. A duck would be as likely to lose itself as a Pottawattamie. I do not speak for the Ottawas: I speak for the Pottawattamies. We are not Jews. We do not wish to be Jews; and what we do not wish to be, we will not be. Our father who has come so far to tell us that we are not Injins, but Jews, is mistaken. I never heard of these Jews before. I do not wish to hear of them again. When a man has heard enough, he does not keep his ears open willingly. It is then best for the speaker to sit down. The Pottawattamies have shut their ears to the great medicine-priest of the pale-faces. What he says may be true of other tribes, but it is not true of the Pottawatttamies. We are not lost; we are not Jews. I have done."

This speech was received with general favor. The notion that the Indians were not Indians, but Jews, was far from being agreeable to those who had heard what had been said on the subject; and the opinions of Crowsfeather possessed the great advantage of reflecting the common sentiment on this interesting subject. When this is the case, a very little eloquence or logic goes a great way; and, on the whole, the address of the last speaker was somewhat better received than that of the first.

It was now confidently believed that Peter would rise. But he did not. That mysterious chief was not yet prepared to speak, or he was judiciously exciting expectation by keeping back. There were at least ten minutes of silent smoking, ere a chief, whose name rendered into English was Bough of the Oak, arose, evidently with a desire to help the time along. Taking his cue from the success of Crows-feather, he followed up the advantage obtained by that chief, a.s.sailing the theory of the missionary from another quarter.

"I am an Injin," said Bough of the Oak; "my father was an Injin, and my mother was the daughter of an Injin. All my fathers were red men, and all their sons. Why should I wish to be anything else? I asked my brother, the medicine-priest, and he owned that Jews are pale-faces.

This he should not have owned if he wished the Injins to be Jews. My skin is red. The Manitou of my fathers so painted it, and their child will not try to wash out the color. Were the color washed out of my face, I should be a pale-face! There would not be paint enough to hide my shame. No; I was born red, and will die a red man. It is not good to have two faces. An Injin is not a snake, to cast his skin. The skin in which he was born he keeps. He plays in it when a child; he goes in it to his first hunt; the bears and the deer know him by it; he carries it with him on the warpath, and his enemies tremble at the sight of it; his squaw knows him by that skin when he comes back to his wigwam; and when he dies, he is put aside in the same skin in--which he was born. There is but one skin, and it has but one color. At first, it is little. The pappoose that wears it is little. There is not need of a large skin.

But it grows with the pappoose, and the biggest warrior finds his skin around him. This is because the Great Spirit fitted it to him. Whatever the Manitou does is good.

"My brothers have squaws--they have pappooses. When the pappoose is put into their arms, do they get the paint-stones, and paint it red? They do not. It is not necessary. The Manitou painted it red before it was born.

How this was done I do not know. I am nothing but a poor Injin, and only know what I see. I have seen that the pappooses are red when they are born, and that the warriors are red when they die. They are also red while living. It is enough. Their fathers could never have been pale-faces, or we should find some white spots on their children. There are none.

"Crowsfeather has spoken of the Jews as lost. I am not surprised to hear it. It seems to me that all pale-faces get lost. They wander from their own hunting-grounds into those of other people. It is not so with Injins. The Pottawattamie does not kill the deer of the Iowa, nor the Ottawa the deer of the Menomenees. Each tribe knows its own game. This is because they are not lost. My pale-face father appears to wish us well. He has come on a long and weary path to tell us about his Manitou.

For this I thank him. I thank all who wish to do me good. Them that wish to do me harm I strike from behind. It is our Injin custom. I do not wish to hurt the medicine-priest, because I think he wishes to do me good, and not to do me harm. He has a strange law. It is to do good to them that do harm to you. It is not the law of the red men. It is not good law. I do not wonder that the tribes which follow such a law get lost. They cannot tell their friends from their enemies. They can have no people to scalp. What is a warrior if he cannot find someone to scalp? No; such a law would make women of the bravest braves in the Openings, or on the prairie. It may be a good law for Jews, who get lost; but it is a bad law for Injins, who know the paths they travel.

Let another speak."

This brief profession of faith, on the subject that had been so recently broached in the council, seemed to give infinite satisfaction. All present evidently preferred being red men, who knew where they were, than to be pale-faces who had lost their road. Ignorance of his path is a species of disgrace to an American savage, and not a man there would have confessed that his particular division of the great human family was in that dilemma. The idea that the Yankees were "lost," and had got materially astray, was very grateful to most who heard it; and Bough of the Oak gained a considerable reputation as an orator, in consequence of the lucky hits made on this occasion.

Another long, ruminating pause, and much pa.s.sing of the pipe of peace succeeded. It was near half an hour after the last speaker had resumed his seat, ere Peter stood erect. In that long interval expectation had time to increase, and curiosity to augment itself. Nothing but a very great event could cause this pondering, this deliberation, and this unwillingness to begin. When, however, the time did come for the mysterious chief to speak, the man of many scalps to open his mouth, profound was the attention that prevailed among all present. Even after he had arisen, the orator stood silently looking around him, as if the throes of his thoughts had to be a little suppressed before he could trust his tongue to give them utterance.

"What is the earth?" commenced Peter, in a deep, guttural tone of voice, which the death-like stillness rendered audible even to the outermost boundaries of the circle of admiring and curious countenances. "It is one plain adjoining another; river after river; lake after lake; prairie touching prairie; and pleasant woods, that seem to have no limits, all given to men to dwell in. It would seem that the Great Spirit parcelled out this rich possession into hunting-grounds for all. He colored men differently. His dearest children he painted red, which is his own color. Them that he loved less he colored less, and they had red only in spots. Them he loved least he dipped in a dark dye, and left them black.

These are the colors of men. If there are more, I have not seen them.

Some say there are. I shall think so, too, when I see them.

"Brothers, this talk about lost tribes is a foolish talk. We are not lost. We know where we are, and we know where the Yankees have come to seek us. My brother has well spoken. If any are lost, it is the Yankees.

The Yankees are Jews; they are lost. The time is near when they will be found, and when they will again turn their eyes toward the rising sun.

They have looked so long toward the setting sun, that they cannot see clearly. It is not good to look too long at the same object. The Yankees have looked at our hunting-grounds, until their eyes are dim. They see the hunting-grounds, but they do not see all the warriors that are in them. In time, they will learn to count them.

"Brothers, when the Great Spirit made man, he put him to live on the earth. Our traditions do not agree in saying of what he was made.

Some say it was of clay, and that when his spirit starts for the happy hunting-grounds, his body becomes clay again. I do not say that this is so, for I do not know. It is not good to say that which we do not know to be true. I wish to speak only the truth. This we do know. If a warrior die, and we put him in the earth, and come to look for him many years afterward, nothing but bones are found. All else is gone. I have heard old men say that, in time, even these bones are not to be found.

It is so with trees; it may be so with men. But it is not so with hunting-grounds. They were made to last forever.

"Brothers, you know why we have come together on this prairie. It was to count the pale-faces, and to think of the way of making their number less. Now is a good time for such a thing. They have dug up the hatchet against each other, and when we hear of scalps taken among them, it is good for the red men. I do not think our Canada father is more our friend than the great Yankee, Uncle Sam. It is true, he gives us more powder, and blankets, and tomahawks, and rifles than the Yankee, but it is to get us to fight his battles. We will fight his battles. They are our battles, too. For this reason we will fight his enemies.

"Brothers, it is time to think of our children. A wise chief once told me how many winters it is since a pale-face was first seen among red men. It was not a great while ago. Injins are living who have seen Injins, whose own fathers saw the first pale-faces. They were few.

They were like little children, then; but now they are grown to be men.

Medicine-men are plenty among them, and tell them how to raise children.

The Injins do not understand this. Small-pox, fire-water, bad hunting, and frosts, keep us poor, and keep our children from growing as fast as the children of the pale-faces. Brothers, all this has happened within the lives of three aged chiefs. One told to another, and he told it to a third. Three chiefs have kept that tradition. They have given it to me. I have cut notches on this stick (holding up a piece of ash, neatly trimmed, as a record) for the winters they told me, and every winter since I have cut one more. See; there are not many notches. Some of our people say that the pale-faces are already plentier than leaves on the trees. I do not believe this. These notches tell us differently. It is true the pale-faces grow fast, and have many children, and small-pox does not kill many of them, and their wars are few; but look at this stick. Could a canoe-full of men become as many as they say, in so few winters? No; it is not so. The stories we have heard are not true. A crooked tongue first told them. We are strong enough still to drive these strangers into the great salt lake, and get back all our hunting-grounds. This is what I wish to have done.

"Brothers, I have taken many scalps. This stick will tell the number."

Here one of those terrible gleams of ferocity to which we have before alluded, pa.s.sed athwart the dark countenance of the speaker, causing all present to feel a deeper sympathy in the thoughts he would express.

"There are many. Every one has come from the head of a pale-face. It is now twenty winters since I took the scalp of a red man. I shall never take another. We want all of our own warriors, to drive back the strangers.

"Brothers, some Injins tell us of different tribes. They talk about distant tribes as strangers. I tell you we are all children of the same father. All our skins are red. I see no difference between an Ojebway, and a Sac, or a Sioux. I love even a Cherokee." Here very decided signs of dissatisfaction were manifested by several of the listeners; parties of the tribes of the great lakes having actually marched as far as the Gulf of Mexico to make war on the Indians of that region, who were generally hated by them with the most intense hatred. "He has the blood of our fathers in him. We are brothers, and should live together as brothers. If we want scalps, the pale-faces have plenty. It is sweet to take the scalp of a pale-face. I know it. My hand has done it often, and will do it again. If every Injin had taken as many scalps as I have taken, few of these strangers would now remain.

"Brothers, one thing more I have to say. I wish to hear others, and will not tell all I know this time. One thing more I have to say, and I now say it. I have told you that we must take the scalps of all the pale-faces who are now near us. I thought there would have been more, but the rest do not come. Perhaps they are frightened. There are only six. Six scalps are not many. I am sorry they are so few. But we can go where there will be more. One of these six is a medicine-man. I do not know what to think. It may be good to take his scalp. It may be bad.

Medicine-men have great power. You have seen what this bee-hunter can do. He knows how to talk with bees. Them little insects can fly into small places, and see things that Injins cannot see. The Great Spirit made them so. When we get back all the land, we shall get the bees with it, and may then hold a council to say what it is best to do with them.

Until we know more, I do not wish to touch the scalp of that bee-hunter.

It may do us great harm. I knew a medicine-man of the pale-faces to lose his scalp, and small-pox took off half the band that made him prisoner and killed him. It is not good to meddle with medicine-men. A few days ago, and I wanted this young man's scalp, very much. Now, I do not want it. It may do us harm to touch it. I wish to let him go, and to take his squaw with him. The rest we can scalp."

Peter cunningly made no allusion to Margery, until just before he resumed his seat, though now deeply interested in her safety. As for le Bourdon, so profound was the impression he had made that morning, that few of the chiefs were surprised at the exemption proposed in his favor.

The superst.i.tious dread of witchcraft is very general among the American savages; and it certainly did seem to be hazardous to plot the death of a man, who had even the bees that were humming on all sides of them under his control. He might at that very moment be acquainted with all that was pa.s.sing; and several of the grim-looking and veteran warriors who sat in the circle, and who appeared to be men able and willing to encounter aught human, did not fail to remember the probability of a medicine-man's knowing who were his friends, and who his enemies.

When Peter sat down, there was but one man in the circle of chiefs who was resolved to oppose his design of placing Boden and Margery without the pale of the condemned. Several were undecided, scarce knowing what to think of so sudden and strange a proposition, but could not be said to have absolutely adhered to the original scheme of cutting off all.

The exception was Ungque. This man--a chief by a sort of sufferance, rather than as a right--was deadly hostile to Peter's influence, as has been said, and was inclined to oppose all his plans, though compelled by policy to be exceedingly cautious how he did it. Here, however, was an excellent opportunity to strike a blow, and he was determined not to neglect it. Still, so wily was this Indian, so much accustomed to put a restraint on his pa.s.sions and wishes, that he did not immediately arise, with the impetuous ardor of frank impulses, to make his reply, but awaited his time.